If Meredith foresaw the outcome of the Civil War, it was still a long time before he was proved correct. The conflict was slow and halting – a skirmish here, a town or fortified house besieged there, a few pitched battles. Yet, when they emerged from the royal base at Oxford, King Charles and Prince Rupert had proved formidable. In the north, the big port of Newcastle, which supplied most of London’s coal, was gained for the king. Also much of the west. Even after the Presbyterian Scots had come down and helped inflict a severe defeat on them at Marston Moor, the message came back: “The Royalists are still in the field.” Part of the trouble lay in the Roundhead troops. The trained bands from London were usually the best, but they had still struck their colours and marched off home whenever their pay was late.
The war brought occasional hostilities to other parts of the country, but to Jane, living within the huge earthwork enclosure at London it brought, month after month, only a great silence.
True, once a week, before he had left, she would see Gideon and his men marching proudly off to Finsbury Field or the Artillery Ground outside Moorgate where the city’s trained bands would gather. Then the rattle of musketry and the bangs of cannon might go on a whole afternoon. Sometimes great columns of Roundhead troops would depart, returning again, dusty and bandaged, a few weeks later. But most of the time the city was subdued. Half the stalls in Cheapside market were gone. The Royal Exchange was often deserted. With West Country cloth supplies cut off by the Royalists, and little market for luxury imports, the merchants were mostly lying low. Some, suspected as Royalists, had gone to ground entirely. Sir Julius Ducket, it was said, had been completely ruined. As for ordinary folk like herself, though there was food enough, there had been some miserably cold months when the Royalists had stopped the Newcastle coal supply; and the demands, every month, for taxes to pay the troops had sharply depleted her income. Yet, strange to say, she rather enjoyed it. The threatened attack never came and after a while she was sure it never would. Life might be hard, but at least it was different. And then, of course, there was Dogget.
Why hadn’t he gone to Massachusetts? It was funny how there had always been some excuse. The first year or two it had been the business; then two of Gideon’s children had been sick. “Don’t you think you should join your wife?” she had sometimes urged. But he never had. And then, when the Civil War began and Gideon was off soldiering, Dogget really was needed to keep the business going and provide for Gideon’s family.
It happened on a September afternoon, just months after the ramparts had been completed. Dogget and Jane had walked out of the old city for a stroll on Moorfields. The sun was shining. It was quiet. In the middle distance, nearly a mile away, she could see the sentries up on the rampart at Shoreditch, like so many little dots against the open blue sky; and it had just occurred to her that, within the great enclosure – she could not say why, but it was so – it was as if they were inhabiting some unreal, timeless place that had somehow separated itself from the rest of the world, when, catching her thought, he half turned to her and remarked:
“It makes you feel young, out here.”
Yes, she thought, she did feel young. She smiled.
“You haven’t changed much, anyway,” she remarked. He was grizzled now, his face lined, but otherwise he was the same John Dogget who had once shown her King Harry’s barge.
He nodded. He was looking at her.
“What is it?”
He did not reply. He was still looking at her, smiling.
“Oh.” She looked down, and thought for a little as they walked towards the ramparts. Then, after a little while, she had taken his hand and gently squeezed. Neither of them spoke. They had just walked back to the house together, in the huge, afternoon light. And so, in that strange, silent space created by the ramparts of war, their affair had begun: two lovers in their sixties, linked by their past and by long affection, finding comfort, companionship and even excitement, both a little surprised that such things were still possible.
They had been discreet. Only Meredith, clever Meredith, had guessed: and him, she knew, she could trust. Not that it really mattered much anyway. If they brought each other happiness, who cared?
But that had been five years ago, before the great change in events that had brought England to the threshold of the present, awesome crisis. And now, as she looked fondly at the sleeping form beside her, she heard the urgent words that Meredith had spoken to her just days before.
“Soon you will be in danger. Perhaps great danger.” He had looked at her earnestly. “Who exactly knows?”
“You.” She had considered. “I’m not really sure. People may suspect. But why is it so important?”
He had shaken his head impatiently.
“You don’t understand.” Then he had looked thoughtful. “Tell me one thing – this is important. Does Gideon know?”
Gideon picked up his quill pen. The letter to Martha lay before him, but for the hundredth time he hesitated. He glanced across the room at his family. There was his dear wife, in sickness if asked to travel, in health otherwise, quietly sewing; beside her, Patience, soon to marry; Perseverance, still without a suitor. And the light of his life, O Be Joyful, a short, stocky youth now, reading a bible. The boy had shown such talent that, instead of taking him into his own business, Gideon had apprenticed him to the finest woodcarver he could find. But even more than this talent, he was grateful that God had granted his son such a sweet and religious nature. How pleased and proud Martha would be if she could see him now. But this thought, instead of gladdening his heart, only brought him back, uncomfortably, to the letter. And to the agonizing question. Should he tell Martha about Dogget and Jane?
Sometimes he had even tried to pretend to himself that he did not know, that he had not seen them kissing when they thought themselves alone, or seen Dogget disappear into her house. As far as he could tell, few others realized. To his children, Jane was Aunt Jane. And when a neighbour had once innocently remarked – “Dogget and Mrs Wheeler are cousins, aren’t they?” – he had just smiled and nodded. God forgive him for the lie. When it was he, Gideon Carpenter, who was supposed to be setting the moral example in the parish of St Lawrence Silversleeves.
For that was his role now. Ever since they had kicked out Sir Julius Ducket and his friends. Three times now, the whole congregation had elected him as one of the vestrymen. And their own moral standards, he was glad to say, were commendably high. More than half the men wore Puritan jerkins and hats; their women wore long dresses of grey or brown, with bonnets modestly tied under their chins.
So why had he allowed this sinful betrayal of the pious woman he revered to continue? Partly, he admitted, it was the fear of a family row and of a possible scandal. But even more importantly, to keep Dogget happy. Without the older man working in the business he would not have felt free – and this was something that Martha, surely, would understand – to serve the still greater cause, whose work would be completed this very next morning. The work of Cromwell and his saints.
Oliver Cromwell had won the Civil War. After those first inconclusive years, it was the vigorous East Anglian member of Parliament who had gone off, raised his own properly trained troop of horse, the Ironsides, and demanded of Parliament: “Now let me reorganize the whole army.”
What thrilling times those had been. Leaving Dogget and his family in London, Gideon had gone eagerly to join Cromwell’s force. The New Model Army, it was called. This full-time, trained and disciplined army, its core already battle-hardened, and commanded by Cromwell and his colleague General Fairfax, turned the course of the war. Within a year it had inflicted a crushing defeat on Charles and Rupert at Naseby, and taken one royal stronghold after another. Oxford fell. Charles surrendered to the Scots. The Scots sold him to the English, who kept him under house arrest.
But what mattered to Gideon was that these New Model Roundheads were not just soldiers. They were saints.
For “Saints” was what they called themsel
ves. Some, of course, were only mercenaries; but most were men like himself – men who sought justice, soldiers for Christ, men who were fighting so that now at last, even in England, they might build that shining city on a hill. God was with them, they were sure. Hadn’t He given them victory? This knowledge gave them authority; and authority was needed. For if not themselves, who could they trust?
Certainly not the Parliament. Half the time the army had not been paid. The “Saints” knew very well that most of the parliament men just wanted to strike a deal with the king on the minimum possible terms. Certainly not the Londoners. “London,” Gideon would sadly admit, “is so big it is a hydra-headed monster.” Most of the population supported the Roundhead cause, but you never knew how many secret Royalists there might be. Above all, the Londoners’ only real interest was in themselves and in their profits. Once the threat of the Royalist army was gone, they could not wait to disband the “Saints” and settle with Charles as well.
And certainly, most certainly, not the king. Endlessly prevaricating, trying to play one of his enemies against the other, promising anything in the hope that, in the end, he could still return to rule exactly as before, when finally King Charles had managed to foment another rising, the “Saints” had had enough. Despite the Londoners’ howls of protest, Fairfax had come down and quartered his army on the city. The treasure of several livery companies was seized to pay the troops. And just a few weeks ago, to Gideon’s huge satisfaction, Colonel Pride with a body of troops had gone to Westminster and thrown out all the members of Parliament who were too faint-hearted for the great cause, which was, quite simply, to rebuild England.
In the last two years another heady realization had come upon him. “There is no power left that can stand against us.” Cromwell’s army was the only true power left in the land. Disciplined and united, it could impose its will. A captive king, a flaccid Parliament: to the saints fell the opportunity, and the responsibility, of fashioning the old country again, on a new model.
But what exactly was that new model to be? Even now, Gideon was not quite certain.
When the Civil War began, he had been clear, like most Roundheads: the king must be reined in by Parliament; the bishops and all their works must go. Some sort of Presbyterian Church he had supposed – not quite so dour and rigid as the Scottish version, though – had seemed desirable. But as the war continued, and the fellowship of Cromwell’s army uplifted him, he had begun with his fellow saints to envision a still brighter and better hope. A new world, here in the old. How often, then, he had turned to the letters he had received from Martha; and how they had inspired him with their account of Massachusetts where, unfettered by bishops, the chosen men of each congregation elected not only their pastors but the governors and magistrates as well; where taxes were raised only by consent and where all men lived under strict biblical law. Surely, Gideon thought, this state of Massachusetts must be close to that godly kingdom, that shining city on a hill.
Some of his fellow saints, known as “Levellers”, wanted to go further than this, giving every man a vote and even abolishing private property. Cromwell was against this, and so, it was clear from her letters, was Martha.
Right or wrong on these or any other matters, she had been for him all these years like a beacon, steadfastly shining across the ocean; and how he wished she were at his side now, as, after the terrible deed of the coming morning was done, he and the saints prepared to enter the promised land.
So what, now, should he say to her? How much should he tell? Still, in a trembling of conscience, he hesitated before, finally, he began to write.
So it had come to this. Julius sat alone in the panelled parlour for the solemn vigil of the night.
They were going to kill King Charles in the morning. After a shameful mockery of a trial, the Roundheads were going to murder their anointed king.
If Sir Julius Ducket could find any consolation at all in that terrible night, it was this: he had been loyal. “I have kept faith,” he murmured, “until the end.”
And he had suffered for it. After his arrest by Gideon, he had found himself held under guard with three dozen other prominent Royalist citizens. When asked why, they were told, “You are Malignants,” as though they were some disease upon the body politic. The first week they had not even been allowed any visitors; but when at last his wife had been permitted to visit him, he had received another shock. When he suggested that she and the children should go to Bocton she replied: “Bocton? Didn’t you know? All the estates of the Malignants have been taken over by the Roundheads. We’re forbidden to go near the place.”
How depressing those times had been. In the first weeks he had continued to hope that the Royalists would win. Stories came back: Prince Rupert had led another successful charge; the London-trained bands had refused to fight and gone home because they weren’t paid. But still he had been held like a criminal. Months had gone by and then at last he had been taken to the Guildhall and ushered into a room where half a dozen Roundhead officers were seated at a table.
“Sir Julius,” he was told, “you may go free; but there is a price to be paid.”
“How much?”
“Twenty thousand pounds,” they coolly informed him.
“Twenty? I’d be ruined,” he protested, “Leave me in jail.”
“We could fine you anyway,” one of them remarked.
And so, early in 1644, Sir Julius Ducket had returned sadly to his house behind St Mary-le-Bow, to try to begin his life again.
But how were they to live? The fine had consumed almost all his assets. His wife had some jewellery. There was the big house itself, but to sell, even if he had wanted to, would have been very difficult while London was still like a city under siege. He looked about for some business to engage in, but trade was almost at a standstill. Three gloomy weeks passed during which he cautioned his family: “We shall have to be careful not to spend too much.” As for the future, he could not see what he was going to do.
It was quite by chance, one March day, that he suddenly remembered the pirate’s treasure.
The cellar was dark and smelled musty as he went down, carrying a lamp. He realized it was thirty years since he had last seen the old chest. A mass of domestic objects had piled up in front of the place where it used to lie since then and he wondered if it was even there any more. But after a few minutes he gave a grunt of satisfaction. There it was: covered with dust but still the same, dark and mysterious as ever.
For a moment he hesitated. What was it his father had told him all those years ago? That he would guard his chest with his life. And why? Because he had given his word. His sacred word. But then again, that had been thirty years ago. The pirate had never returned. There wasn’t a chance, by now, that the fellow was even alive. Nor was there likely to be any family to claim the chest. Hadn’t he been a rover of the seas? The sea chest belonged to nobody. What was in there, he wondered. Money? Stolen silver? A map, even – he smiled to himself – of some distant island where treasure was buried? Taking a hammer and chisel, he set to work. The chest was strong; the old padlocks were solid; but at last, with three great cracks, he managed to break them open. Slowly he lifted the creaking old lid.
He gasped. It was bursting with coins. Coins of every kind – gold and silver, English shillings, Spanish doubloons, heavy dollars from the Low Countries. Many were fifty or sixty years old, from the days of the Spanish Armada and good Queen Bess, but good gold and silver nonetheless. God knows what the treasure was worth. Many thousands of pounds. A fortune. He was saved.
From this moment, the slow recovery of Sir Julius Ducket had begun. He was very careful: after splitting the money up into twenty different bags, he secreted each one in a place where it would not be found. He said nothing, even to his children, about the treasure, but remarking that he had found a little cash, he was able to do some modest buying and selling of merchandise, supplementing the small profits with a little extra from the hoard so that, without draw
ing attention to themselves, the family were able to live quietly. If he produced one of the antique coins, he would remark casually, “I had this from my father,” and the word in London was: “Poor Ducket’s broken. He’s scraping by on any old coins he can find around his house.”
He still had to be careful. Though there were a number of known Royalists like himself in the city, he was also well aware that they were also watched. Gideon, he suspected, knew of every move he made. He would often stand in Cheapside by the stalls, to see if anyone was going down the lane to his house. Yet he was still able to outwit the Roundheads. Once, in late spring, he even managed to slip out of the city on a special errand.
If Julius had felt downhearted at the loss of his brother, and perhaps, still, a little awkward about his use of a treasure that was not strictly his, the secret journey he made to the king’s court at Oxford did much to raise his spirits. Together with two other trusted men, he had ridden out of London early one morning dressed as a Roundhead – a disguise they had kept on for more than twenty miles. Sewn into the clothes of the three men were quantities of gold coins provided by Julius from the treasure. Between them they were able to carry almost a thousand pounds. By the following evening they were at the defensive ramparts round the old university city; and the next day, in Christ Church college, Julius was able to present his money to the king in person.
“Faithful Sir Julius.” It was the proudest moment of his life when King Charles spoke those words. “We count you amongst our most loyal friends.”
“I should gladly fight for Your Majesty,” he declared. “But I have no skill at arms.”
“We should rather,” the king replied, “that you remain in London. We need faithful friends we can rely on there.” And for fully half an hour the king had walked with him around the old college quadrangle, asking for all kinds of information about the state of the city and its defences. For his part, the king did not hesitate to give him his confidence, explaining: “Many of my well-wishers would have me compromise my conscience. But this I must not do. I have a sacred duty.” It was, however, his final words, just as they were parting, that had gone straight to Julius’s heart. “I cannot tell,” King Charles said quietly, “how this great matter will turn out. That is in God’s hands.” He looked solemn. “But if anything should befall me, Sir Julius, I have two sons – two of the blood royal to succeed me. May I ask that you will keep faith with them, as you have with me?”
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